Editorial article published in the The Ecologist Vol. 3 No. 8, August 1973 – in which Goldsmith anticipates the 1973 oil crisis and much of what has gone on in the Middle East since.
Should people be made to face facts or be left with their illusions? Most people would opt for the former course because they believe that knowledge is a good thing. The same people, however, would lift up their hands in pious and self-righteous horror if someone attempted to deprive them of some of their most cherished illusions – those on which they most depend for the maintenance of their mental equilibrium, i.e. in which they have the strongest psychological stake. However, in order to bring about those changes in public policy necessary to prevent the terrible calamities towards which our society is moving like a moth towards a light, some of the illusions of industrial man have got to be dispelled.
One of them is that industrial society can be maintained on its course during the next two or three decades without indulging in some pretty nasty warfare. We have recently seen how Britain has reacted to a resource shortage. Fish is getting scarce, the Icelanders are making it scarcer, at least to the British, so out goes the Royal Navy.
Precisely the same thing is happening in the Mediterranean. The Moroccans are threatening Spanish fish catches and the latter are threatening violence to ensure their supplies. Not long ago the Israelis and the Jordanians nearly went to war for their water supplies. They were diverting the waters of the River Jordan for their requirements. Water, like fish, is also becoming a valuable resource. In Britain there is already talk of rationing it, and it is impossible to satisfy the US’s ever increasing needs for water without importing it from Canada. Are the Canadians willing to see their lakes plundered for the benefit of American industry? There is already considerable opposition and it is likely to grow. If it becomes too powerful what will the Americans do? Allow the economy to collapse or invade Canada?
Energy is, as everybody knows, the key resource. Its use is proportionate to Gross National Product. If the latter does not increase from year to year, the result is unemployment and probably a stock exchange crash and even worse unemployment – a combination of events that no government can support.
A lot is written about alternative energy sources, nuclear power, coal, liquid hydrogen, geothermal power. None of these can begin to satisfy the requirements of our expanding industrial society in the next decades.
Energy is another word for oil, and so it will be for some time. This is one of the facts people have got to face. Now where does the oil come from? People talk of the North Sea. This represents no more than two or three years of world consumption. We also hear a lot about Alaska, but Alaskan oil is negligible when we are dealing with the quantities required to sustain industrial society. If energy equals oil then oil equals the Persian Gulf, because that is where the oil is. That is the only place we know of where there are really massive resources of oil.
At the moment the Persian Gulf countries are selling us oil (albeit at an ever increasing price), but what happens if they decide to stop doing so? Are the Americans and the Japanese and the West Europeans going to sit back and allow their respective economies to collapse? So far people have preferred not to face this question. The idea that a handful of oil sheiks can cause the complete collapse of industrial society throughout the world is not one that people cherish, it makes complete nonsense of all our governmental policies which tend towards making all human activities more and more dependent on oil.
It is refreshing to see someone facing facts at last. Senator William Fulbright, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee has stated in the Senate that American policy-makers “may come to the conclusion that military action is required” to protect American oil interests. Needless to say, there was an outcry. Highly cherished illusions were shattered. America, like Britain, likes to think it is a benign and peace-loving country whose sole preoccupation is the happiness and welfare of the people of the earth. Now we are told that she should actually go to war, and for what reason? Not to defend some great ideal like ‘the American way of life’ against those wicked communists, but simply in the interests of commerce – for lolly.
Let us face it, if the Arabs withhold their oil they will be made to part with it by force and what is more with Britain’s connivance. I say this with total conviction, as something so evident that it is almost embarrassing to have to say it.
What is more, Mr Heath and Mr Wilson or whoever has the doubtful pleasure of trying to govern this increasingly ungovernable country, may try to justify his action by appealing to all sorts of high-falutin’ principles in order to satisfy his conscience and that of his electorate. But the fact is, he has no alternative, unless of course he opts out and adopts a policy on the lines of A Blueprint for Survival.
Besides, Britain has more experience in this field than the US. After all, what was the Biafran war about? The perpetuation of the Hausa empire? Or General Gowan’s beautiful brown eyes? No, it was to protect our local oil interests, which were nothing like as vital to us as Persian Gulf oil is today.
It might be argued that the USSR will not allow America to interfere in the Middle East; after all it was basically Russian pressure which put an abrupt end to the Suez enterprise. But times have changed. The USSR is now, and probably will remain, dependent on American corn (this year they imported 20 million tons of it). They also need American capital and know-how to exploit the massive untapped mineral resources of Siberia and the US can be paid for all its services with much-needed natural gas.
With an increasingly hostile China rapidly teaming up with Japan one can foresee a very close alliance indeed which makes it more than likely that Russia will close its eyes to the little indiscretions of its new chum. Let us face it, the Arab Sheiks are too rich for their own good. Only the most naive can really believe that they will be allowed to sit for very long on their treasure hoard.
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